The iPhone and Apple News have never been as sexy … Jean Francois Martin sits in for speechless Oliver and provides a French twist.
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The Show Notes (aka Script) below the break…
News
Apple apparently has seen that their recent decision to pull 5000 apps from the store for being “overtly sexual” was a bit overreaching. I say “apparently” because no public communication has occurred, not even to the maker of on swimwear app, who suddenly found his app reinstated. The app by the name “Simply Beach” is available for free and ages 4 and up. So if your taste is for wet and hot, then why not get this app? Even if hot is just by the sun and wet through sea water. The only thing naked on the apps of the simply group is their intent on selling you articles, their apps are catalogs with built in shopping basket.
On association that was key in orchestrating the public opinion against porn on the iTunes is the PTC, the Parents Television Council. The immediately took favorable note and issued a press release applauding Apple’s action. But they seem to be hard to satisfy, the press release quotes the PTC president Tim Winter:
“Apple has taken a positive first step towards eliminating kids’ access to sexually explicit and pornographic content on its product lineup and we applaud the company’s efforts. Apple has made a responsible move and parents are appreciative of the company’s concern for the well-being of children.”
First Step? Seriously? What else does the PTC try to get Apple to do? Ah, right the next day after this applauding press release the PTC issued another one, their new target being filthy TV shows like “Two and a Half Men”, “Gossip Girl” and “Family Guy”. Apple apparently has been buying advertisement slots around those TV shows.
Only in America…. well, at least none of use are in the TV sitcom business. And thankfully we are not working for Apple, because for these poor people PTC is short for Pain in The Crotch.
Besides of sexy apps Apple also continues to clean up the app store in other areas. Recent victim of this crusade are several WiFi scanners for aledged use of unpublished APIs to show available WiFi networks. One app that did nothing more than quack got rejected for “minimal functionality”.
While we’re still waiting for the actually availability of the iPad a new rumor has cropped up claiming that there are production problems. Apple was planning to make 800,000 iPads per Month and now there might only be 300,000. This shortage could lead to initial availability being restricted to the USA. We will see. Maybe I’ll be buying my first iPad in USA anyway when I attend the Voices that Matter conference in Seattle, end of April.
Also they finally announced availability for the USA, Preorders are possible from March 12th with the WiFi-iPad hitting stores on April 3rd. You will also be able to reserve an iPad and pick it up without having to queue. For other countries they have neither stated the local pricing nor the exact days. Actually initially they announced it in countries like UK and Austria with “Wi-Fi models shipping in late March. 3G models shipping in April. [..] pricing to be announced.” But when I checked later, the UK text turned into “Coming late April” while the Austrian announcement completely disappeared. An interesting footnote can be found on the US site: “This device has not yet been authorized as required by the rules of the Federal Communications Commission. This device is not, and may not be, offered for sale or lease, or sold or leased, until authorization is obtained.”
So there might be several issues plaguing the iPad launch. The don’t get the hardware due the this rumored shortage, they don’t get FCC approval because they give the US government agency too little time and maybe they are also worried about currency exchange rates changing too much between now late April to commit to prices.
By the way, somebody wrote an e-mail to sjobs@apple.com asking if the iPad would be able to tether with the iPhone. To which he got a response: No. So if you want or need to be mobile with an iPad you have to wait for the 3G Version. What actually amazes me is not that the answer is No, it’s that people keep getting a response from this e-mail address. Do we really think that Steve Jobs answers all the e-mails he gets on his iPhone? With an outdated firmware version?
According to apple all display issues with the 27″ iMacs have been resolved. You might remember that there where 2 firmware updates targeting the graphics. Apple told Gizmodo:
We’ve addressed the issues that caused display flickering and yellow tint. Customers concerned that their iMac is affected should contact AppleCare.
We always intrigued by the number of people in the financial industry whose sole job seems to be to make fancy calculations out of the few numbers that Apple slips them.
In a report to clients issued Friday, Morgan Stanley’s Katy Huberty offered one of her patented risk-reward snapshots of Apple (AAPL), this one even more optimistic than the last, thanks to what she sees as two new catalysts:
– The iPad launch in March. Huberty is anticipating unit sales of 6 million in calendar 2010, considerably higher than the Street’s consensus of 3-4 million
– New iPhones in June. She’s expecting new models that offer “both a lower total cost of ownership and new functionality, potentially including gesture-based technology”
Tell me if I am wrong, but didn’t those people at least partially cause last year’s economic crisis? So why should be believe one Analyst that predicts a glorious future for Apple? Well, simple really, if you are dependent on the success of the iPhone OS platform then you are willing to give credit to any report that predicts a greatly increasing customer base for all your apps. Millions of new potentials customers?! Let’s get coding!
Ah, and one other thing. Apple has a track record of generally not doing what it is predicted to be doing. If one thing is certain: we will continue to be amazed.
With all the advances in multi-touch input technology it’s only a matter of time until we will see a big trackpad as mouse replacement for Macs. The name most likely will be “Magic Trackpad” as this was on a recent trademark filing of Apple. It would also go together nicely with the Magic Mouse. Gizmodo speculates that it could either be additional sensors for MacBooks which would could detect if you are typing or gesturing and switch on and off parts of an extra wide trackpad. Or it could be a multi-touch gadget for desktop Macs. Maybe we can see something new in this area as soon as June.
Maybe one day I might be able to navigate around multiple files in Xcode with only gestures. But actually I’d prefer if Apple invested their innovation in things like automatic code generation or at least realtime syntax checking like Microsoft’s Visual Studio has it for several years now. Right now I have to frequently hit CMD+B to see my errors.
Apple has relaunched the Mac developer program. Previously you had several choices ranging from free for just Xcode, 500 Dollars for the entry level and 3500 Dollars for the big version. Apple admits that the model they introduced for iPhone developers is more successful and so the made the Mac program more like the iPhone program. So they dropped the price and removed hardware discounts. Now the only thing missing for the revamped program is that Apple starts an app store for Mac apps. Now that would be really something.
About
Jean Francois Martin tells us about his love child Ultimate Password Manager, more about it on tinysofty.com. He also recommends his iPhone Development Blog buildingiphoneapps.blogspot.com
Categories: Podcast
